our 10th year
blog anniversary
If you have assets, prospective beneficiaries, or other connections to foreign countries, you have cross-border or multijurisdictional considerations in your estate planning or administration. Even closer to home, you may encounter the operation of conflicting legal regimes. For this reason, for some purposes, it can be helpful to conceptualize the
Spence v BMO Trust Company, 2016 ONCA 196, is a topical case which has featured in our blog as recently as January 2023. This case serves as a reminder that testamentary freedom – a will-maker’s right to dispose of his or her property as he or she sees fit – is
Now that we are well and truly into calendar 2024, we have the benefit of hindsight. Here are four important Ontario Court of Appeal decisions on trust and estate matters as well as the 2023 “Case of the Year.” Four important Court of Appeal decisions While the Supreme Court of
Notwithstanding that it is a European Union regulation, the European Succession Regulation can be of great assistance to Canadian citizens who have EU connections in their estate planning. In brief, the Regulation applies to all European Union member states, with the exception of Ireland and Denmark, both of which opted
This is definitely dating myself, but in thinking about this blog I was unable to get Jon Bon Jovi’s “It’s My Life” out of my head (check it out on YouTube here). Sorry for the earworm! Mr. Bon Jovi (we’ve never met, so I’ll not call him Jon just yet)
Testamentary freedom – the freedom to dispose of your estate as you wish – is a longstanding principle in Canada and other common law jurisdictions, although each province and territory in Canada has its own governing legislation as well as its own developing caselaw. In contrast, forced heirship is the
In January of this year, our blog “New Year, New Estate Laws Are Here,” summarized the substantive changes to Ontario estate and trust law which came into effect on January 1, 2022. These changes were significant, and we expected significant litigation to go along with them. So far, this abundance
I recently had the pleasure to participate in a webinar for the Canadian Legal Innovation Forum on contemporary drivers, trends and disruptive forces in estates practice and how estate lawyers are evolving their practices to meet them. One of the topics addressed in our panel discussion was generational and societal
As clients are becoming more and more mobile, it is common to have assets all over the world which leads to multi-jurisdictional estate administration on the mobile client’s death or incapacity. There are international treaties that try to make things easier and connect all these jurisdictions. One of these international
Increasingly, people and their assets have connections to several jurisdictions, rather than just one as in times past. Over the course of a lifetime, many of us will leave a trail behind us of real estate, bank accounts, investment accounts, retirement savings plans and pensions, as well as beneficiaries and
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